Premise monitoring alarms are extremely common in both commercial and residential applications. A typical prior art alarm configuration is shown in FIG. 1. The alarm 100 consists of various sensors connected to a central monitoring panel 101. The sensors can include any type of sensor, such as contact sensors 116 for doors and windows, motion detectors 115 to detect motion in specific areas, glass break sensors 114 to detect a broken window, and smoke/fire alarms 113. In many instances, these sensors are separated into specific zones, such as zones 1, 2, 3 and 4, that correspond to a particular area, room, or set of rooms in the building or house, or that correspond to a particular type of alarm, i.e. fire, intrusion, etc.
The control panel is also connected to various other elements that make up the alarm system, such as a monitoring center 107, a siren 106, a back-up power supply 112, remote keypads 109, auxiliary and configuration ports 110, fault relays 108, etc. This allows the alarm panel 101 to communicate the status of the alarm system 100 to the monitoring center 107 should a problem at one of the sensors be detected. In addition to the fault condition, the monitoring panel 101 can indicate the zone in which the alarm is occurring. The alarm system 100 or a monitoring company can then contact the owner of the premises and notify them as to the alarm condition, zone, and sensor type that is causing the alarm.
While the current system works well, the defined zones are limited to the premises being monitored. In the current connected world, it would be preferable if the utility of the premise alarm system could be utilized to indicate problems in remote or mobile premises or items.